The incident was invoked by the parachute mounting position, which then lifted the rear wheels....

Sounds a tad dubious yet at the same time, it also sounds quite feasible too oddly enough.

Because the parachute was mounted to the lower frame member there is a vertical component that tries to lift the back of the car when the 'chute is deployed but it's of no concern at the speeds we were achieving so long as we're going in a straight line. Where it appears things got out of hand was when the 'chute fired into a crosswind introducing a horizontal component too such that the rear of the car was lifted and jerked to the right whereupon it tripped over the right, rear wheel. The 'chute then kept everything sliding in a fairly straight line until it ran out of authority as the speed decayed and the whole shooting match completed a single lazy roll before flopping back onto its wheels. It seems likely that the 'chute mounting position had little or no relevance in the circumstances. Not completely sure on that one - will report in due course.

I'm only a plumber from Cannock...

"As to reward, my profession is its own reward;" Sherlock Holmes.

I have wrought my simple plan
If I give one hour of joy
To the boy who’s half a man,
Or the man who’s half a boy.

I would opine that the position of the chute anchor points were in the best place possible and were not a causative or contributory factor, to raise them would only serve to create a greater lever when the chute is deployed, as such it would take less effort for the chute to pull the car over, especially if there is a lateral component present (ie cross wind).

With regards to Bill's comments on the car tripping over, I would expect to see some rather nice dark black banana shaped tyre marks on the runway surface in an arc travelled by the car as the wheel has offered the tyre side wall to the road surface... You might even see some striations in the marks pending on the nature of the cars movements immediately before it rolled onto its side. Alas I was not there to see it for myself, but I have no doubt the car left a smorgasbord of data behind, post collision.

I would say fit a small drogue chute to shave some of the speed off before the main chute deploys, however, I am told space is a premium at the site.

perhaps air brakes like the buccaneer used to have, or reverse thrust nozzle on the jet pipe.

The runway at Elvington is a 'standard' 3km length. If the timing trap (500m in the case of August) is set in the centre to allow for two way running the distance available to stop, without going past the end of the runway which is never recommended) is 1250 metre or about 3/4 mile. This data and the weight of the jet car, position of CofG and the vehicle wheelbase should give the parachute maker sufficient information to provide a specification for their drogue chute type, chute diameter, mounting position and length of connection 'strop'. Jet dragsters have been running in many countries around the world and yes there have been incidents but more runs are completed safely on drag strips every weekend than have not.

The world of drag racing has speed limits for most jet cars however all, including funny cars, can go to 320/330 when called for in the 1/4 mile. The speed of a UK landspeed jet car, even on Elvington, will need to be in the 330 mph range or even higher. The standing mile jet car record in the USA would probably be the target for any of the UK cars too (324mph).

The highest one way speeds so far recorded in the UK for jet cars are as follows (these are not records):-
average for flying start 1/4 mile - 329.110 mph
average for flying start kilometre - 316.756 mph
average for flying start 500m - 331.592 mph